Victoria Tower Bell
The Victoria Tower Bell is the only relic remaining from the Victoria Tower. It was cast in 1875 and installed in the tower in 1877. The bell fell from the tower during the Centre Block fire of 1916. The actual tower structure (outer walls) survived the fire, but the upper bell tower had collapsed on February 3 and torn down during the reconstruction of the Centre Block.
The bell was restored in the year 2000, and placed on the grounds of Parliament Hill as a monument to the 1916 fire and to Canada's first Centre Block parliamentary building. It is showcased on a circular granite base, etched as the face of a clock, that represents its role in the keeping of time. The bell's inclined position recalls the angle at which it came to rest after falling during the fire of 1916.
Read more about this topic: Victoria Tower (Canada)
Famous quotes containing the words victoria, tower and/or bell:
“The men who are grandfathers should be the fathers. Grandpas get to do it right with their grandchildren.”
—Anonymous Grandparent. As quoted in Women and Their Fathers, by Victoria Secunda, ch. 2 (1992)
“So was produced this tragedy
In a far tower of ivory
Where, O young men, late in the night
All you who drink light and stroke the air
Come back, seeking the night, and cry
To strict Rapunzel to let down her hair.”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“I can entertain the proposition that life is a metaphor for boxing—for one of those bouts that go on and on, round following round, jabs, missed punches, clinches, nothing determined, again the bell and again and you and your opponent so evenly matched it’s impossible not to see that your opponent is you.... Life is like boxing in many unsettling respects. But boxing is only like boxing.”
—Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938)